


I Passed You in a Crowd (thank you and keep in touch)

by DeerstalkerDeathFrisbee



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Foster Family, Alternate Universe - Human, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Families of Choice, Fluff with a smidge of angst, Gen, Keith & Shiro (Voltron) Friendship, M/M, Parenting for Beginners, Thace is so Done, The Bros of Marmora, broganes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-29
Updated: 2018-06-29
Packaged: 2019-05-30 04:29:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,270
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15089018
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DeerstalkerDeathFrisbee/pseuds/DeerstalkerDeathFrisbee
Summary: “What do you mean you lost him?” he demands into the cell phone.“Your foster son is truant, not a missing person, sir.”“I’m pretty sure he becomes a missing person the minute my nine year old kid isn’t at the school I specifically deposited him at three hours ago with the understanding that he would remain there in one piece until 3pm.”Thace is a first-time foster father, Keith is his stubbornly adventurous foster son and Ulaz is the handsome stranger who helps them both find their way home.





	I Passed You in a Crowd (thank you and keep in touch)

**Author's Note:**

> Season six got me in the feels. 
> 
> "You're my brother, I love you" RIP MY HEART
> 
> Anyway, have some fluffy rare pair nonsense, I've been wanting to scribble out some of the shorter rare pair fics I've got knocking around my head so get pumped for that. :) 
> 
> As always, thank you for reading!

**I Passed You in a Crowd (thank you and keep in touch)**

“Thace, phone,” Kolivan says gruffly, sticking his head into the back office, phone in hand like it’s actually physically painful for him to stop terrorizing the shop floor and walk the five yards to the back office where Thace labors away to make sure they all get fucking paid and come out in the black every month.

            Thace, who is actually _not_ laboring away to make sure Kolivan’s Custom Auto actually makes money for once, gestures toward the cell phone jammed against his ear to indicate he’s already on the phone and can’t possibly take on more telephonic communication. Kolivan, apparently unimpressed with Thace’s inability to perform inhuman feats of phone usage, folds his arms, still holding the handset to the shop landline, and blatantly listens in on the exchange.

            Thace can’t be bothered with Kolivan’s resting bitch face at the moment; he’s too busy threatening to tear down the local school district piece by piece.

            “What do you mean you lost him?” he demands into the cell phone.

            _“Your foster son is truant, not a missing person, sir.”_

“I’m pretty sure he becomes a missing person the minute my nine year old kid isn’t at the school I specifically deposited him at three hours ago with the understanding that he would remain there in one piece until 3pm.” Thace isn’t quite shouting, but his teeth are making mincemeat of each word that comes out of his mouth.

            _“This isn’t the first time – ”_

“You’ve lost him before?” Thace’s tone of voice has dropped from ‘cool’ to ‘positively glacial’.

            _“Keith Kogane is an adventurous boy, and not the most academic of – ”_

“Now you’re telling me you have a history of just letting him wander off?” Thace is still managing not to shout, but his tone might just give the poor sap on the other end of the line frostbite at the rate he’s going.

            _“Sir, we’re just notifying you that he’s truant, and asking if you’ve seen him.”_

“I’m at work. On the other side of town. He’s a fourth grader with about five dollars in quarters on him. He’s not going far. I suggest you find him before I find you.”  Great, now he’s threatening a poor office drone that has to deal with the shit show that is helicopter parents and district budget cuts all day long. Parenthood, even foster parenthood is a fucked up rollercoaster ride of emotional nonsense, isn’t it?

            Kolivan holds up the shop handset again, “This might help,” he says neutrally, just holding the device out in the face of Thace’s glare.

            With a long-suffering sigh, Thace turns back to the cell phone; “Hold please,” he grinds out, setting aside the cell and taking the handset from Kolivan, who doesn’t even bother to leave, apparently invested in this train wreck.

            “Kolivan’s Custom Auto, Thace speaking,” he says into the shop phone, trying for professional and only missing by a hair.

            _“Hello, is this Thace Marmora?”_

“Yes,” Thace says warily, eyes flicking up to his brother, who’s still lingering in the doorway, serious eyes staring down the phone in Thace’s hands.

            Twitching an irritated eyebrow at Kolivan’s inscrutable face, Thace turns back to the phone, “Yes. How can I help you?”

            A wary chuckle on the other end of the line and a wry admission, _“I think I may have found something that belongs to you. A Keith Kogane? Small, angry, prone to biting and kicking?”_

Unbidden, a relieved sigh tears its way out of Thace’s chest, “Oh, god, where did he end up?”

            _“At Altea prep.”_

“The _high school_?” Thace buries his free hand in the hair near his temple, “ _How_?” 

            _“I believe he’s quite close to one of the freshmen. They were foster brothers at their previous home, but the system split them up…”_

“Shiro,” Thace breathes out in resignation, hand migrating down to massage his eye socket. Keith wasn’t the chattiest of kids, but even with his periodic bouts of sullen silence, it was easy to hear all the ‘Shiro says’ and ‘Shiro does’ woven into nearly everything he bothers to say.

            _“Yes, he’s one of my students. I’m the school counselor here, my name is Ulaz.”_

“I’ll be right over to pick him up. Sorry about all of this.” Thace is already putting on his leather jacket and grabbing his keys, glad he just drove to work from the elementary school instead of going back home and swapping his car out for the motorcycle he generally prefers.

            _“It’s no problem, really, they’re both here in my office. Keith’s asleep. Getting here took a lot out of him. He said something about climbing a fence…”_

Of course he did. Thace bites back another sigh, realizes here is probably the person _least_ likely to judge him for it and lets it out. “I’m on my way, heading out now. I’ll be there in five minutes.

            _“Don’t break any traffic laws,”_ Ulaz says dryly and Thace snorts.           

            “I would never.” He definitely would. Ulaz seems to understand that, because he chuckles into the receiver.

            _“We’ll be waiting.”_

Thace has no explanation for why the word ‘we’ warms his heart so inexplicably, but it does. He hangs up, shoves the phone in Kolivan’s direction and snatches his cell off his desk to bark an update at the poor office staffer and bolts out the door.

            “Keith’s been found?” Kolivan asks dryly.

            “Yes,” Thace huffs a sigh, “at this rate I need to just put that kid on a leash like a dog and homeschool him.”

            Kolivan snorts, “I considered doing the same thing when I was babysitting you and Antok.

            Thace rolls his eyes, “Antok and I didn’t run away from school.”

            “No, you were worse.”

            Thace will have to let his older brother have the last word this one time, because he doesn’t have time to banter further. He has a kid to go collect.

…

            Ulaz is just as attractive as his honey-smooth voice made him sound over the phone.  He’s tall and angular, with smooth bronze skin, a shaved head and tawny gold eyes the color of good brandy.  He’s wearing a lavender shirt tucked into dark navy slacks over highly polished leather loafers. He’s sleek and elegant like the Swiss watch sitting on his wrist, and Thace simultaneously feels turned on and weirdly defensive about his dark jeans, cheap no-iron-needed collared shirt and leather jacket. Perfectly appropriate work wear for the bookkeeper of a custom auto shop, not so perfect for meeting someone who looks like he should be playing a doctor on TV. A hot doctor from a drama. Like, ‘Grey’s Anatomy’ level or better. He’s too good for soap opera crap.

            He’s thrown out of his weird brain-spiral by Keith. His foster son is sacked out on the worn tapestry patterned couch in Ulaz’s office. Keith’s loose-limbed and easy in sleep the way he never is awake. Awake he’s a live wire, a nexus of sharp energy. He’s sprawled over most of the couch, face buried in the side of an awkward looking teenager wearing a short sleeved white collared shirt and black slacks that had to be the school’s uniform. Thace can’t imagine any fourteen year old voluntarily wearing a short sleeved collared shirt for any other reason.

            The boy who must be the infamous Shiro has his arm tucked around the snoozing Keith and looks up at Thace with an expression halfway between a smile and a grimace. “Hi, you must be Mr. Marmora, Keith’s new foster parent,” he says, holding out the hand not resting protectively on a tousled head of blue-black hair.

            Thace takes his hand gingerly, but is surprised when he gets a firm handshake in return. “You’re Shiro,” he says, no question mark needed, “Keith talks about you. When he does talk.”

            Keith takes that moment to grumble in his sleep and curl up into more of a knot of skinny little kid limbs.

            Shiro’s lips tighten, a cowlick of dark hair falling into remarkably serious eyes. “I didn’t want to leave him behind.  The Holts are great, and Mrs. Holt worked with my parents but…”

            “They didn’t have the means to take on Keith too.” Thace is familiar with this story. Keith’s social worker had explained it to him, words blunt but tone kind. She hadn’t wanted to split up the boys if she could avoid it. Romelle’s powers were limited and on paper this was the best arrangement. Thace knew Keith’s father, he grew up with the boy’s mother. The Holts had been trying for custody of Shiro the moment his parents died. The home he shared with Keith had always been temporary. Keith’s future, with his mother officially Missing in Action an ocean away and his father buried a few blocks down from the little townhouse they’d shared, was far more uncertain.

            “Shiro and I have spoken about Keith quite a bit,” Ulaz says in his soft, velvet voice. Thace’s reptile brain wants to hear that voice purring in his ear in a darkened room. The rest of Thace’s brain wants Thace’s reptile brain to focus, dammit.

            Keith rolls over and wraps both arms around Shiro’s one arm like it’s the blue plush wolf his Marmora ‘uncles’ had given him for his first birthday.

            “I always wanted to know what happened to him. If he was in a good place,” Shiro admits, free hand rubbing the back of his head where the hair was shaved in what had to be an against-the-dress-code undercut.

            “He calls you his brother,” Thace admits, thinking back to the few times Keith’s exploded at him. Keith doesn’t have tantrums, he has explosions, where all the emotions in his little grief-stricken body go supernova and he yells that he wants his mom, he wants his dad, he wants his brother. And when Thace hadn’t known what he was talking about Keith had yelled “SHIRO, YOU DUMBASS” and run away to hide in a kitchen cupboard where he’d feel safe.

            Thace is trying, he really is.

            Shiro looks away, blinking hard like he’s trying to convince his eyes not to fill with tears. “I didn’t want to leave him,” he says in a small voice, “I told him I’d look out for him. I’m sorry – ”

            Ulaz cuts him off, voice gentle, “There is no shame in being happy, Shiro.  Just as there is nothing wrong with hoping Keith is alright. But Keith’s happiness is not your sole responsibility.”

            “No,” Thace chimes in, “he has me for that now too.” He kneels down beside the couch and gentle shakes his kid awake. Keith opens reddened eyes. The grey looks like purple stormclouds just like they do every time he gets upset.

            “Hey buddy, how are you doing?” Thace asks, keeping his voice soft.

            “I found Shiro,” Keith says around stuffed-up sinuses.

            “Yeah, you did, but you really scared me in the process. You can’t just run off like that, ok?”

            “But I found Shiro. I get to keep him if I find him, right?”

            Thace thinks back to a grocery store parking lot and Keith picking up a quarter left on the sidewalk. _“I found it, can I keep it?”_

            “That rule’s only for coins, not for kids, buddy.”

            Keith’s eyes fill with tears and his lips pressed together like he’s telling them not to fall. Keith doesn’t like crying. “But I want to keep him. He’s my brother.” 

            “I know, buddy.” 

            “I can call you. And visit you. Now that I know where you are,” Shiro offers, “I have a phone now. I can give you the number. And you can call me whenever you want, ok? Just don’t run away from school and scare your foster dad, ok?”

            Keith frowns like he’s examining Shiro’s suggestion for loopholes. “Okay. Deal.”

            “No more running away from school?”

            “Not until I can drive.”

            “No running away from school until you can drive?”

            Keith nods, “Sure. Kolivan’s gonna teach me as soon as I can reach the pedals anyway. He said so.”

            Thace is going to be having words with his brother after this.

            Ulaz chuckles, “Shiro, why don’t you give Keith your phone number and take him to get some lunch in the cafeteria while your foster father and I talk.”

            Keith smiles one of the tiny, sweet smiles Thace remembers from Before; when Jack Kogane was still alive and Krolia hadn’t disappeared in a foreign desert, and grabs Shiro’s wrist to drag him off the couch, “Come on, time for food, Shiro,” he says with the kind of certainty that comes from nine whole years of life experience. Shiro follows after his tiny friend with a wry smile and patient humor in his eyes.

            The children gone, Thace turns back to Ulaz. “You wanted to speak with me?”

            Ulaz gives him a weary smile, “Forgive me if this question seems inappropriate, but would you like to join me for lunch?” 

            “To talk about the kids?”

            Ulaz shrugs, the merest downturn of his lips the only visual indicator that he’s even slightly disappointed by Thace’s response, “If you wish.”

            Thace’s eyes narrow, “Or is this a more, personal, date-like lunch?”

            Another shrug, this one accompanied by a slight uptick to those thin, expressive lips. “If you wish.”

            Thace finds his own mouth twisting towards a smile, “Have you seen _The Princess Bride_ , by any chance?” 

            “No, why?”

            Thace grins, “If this lunch goes well that can be date number two. I think you’ll appreciate the irony.”

            And that’s what wins him the first of Ulaz’s bright, practically bio-luminescent smiles.

**Author's Note:**

> Fic title from 'Raisins' by the Barenaked Ladies
> 
> Some headcanons that didn't make it into the fic: Kolivan, Antok, Krolia, and Thace were all adopted and raised together. The reason the shop is called 'Kolivan's Custom Auto' and not 'Marmora Autor' is because of the matching hard 'K' sounds in 'Kolivan' and 'custom' but then Kolivan refused to spell 'Custom' with a K because he thinks that's ridiculous. Shiro's parents were doctors, they did research in immunizations and infectious diseases with Colleen Holt, who I headcanon is also a doctor. Alfor is the benevolently insane principal of Altea Prep who is known for his outrageous pranks on his cranky-but-not-evil vice principal and bff-4-life (his words) Zarkon. Honerva is the chemistry teacher Zarkon has been crushing on for an actual century.


End file.
